Most Maryland crabs come from Asia

Fifteen years ago, Steve Phillips, of the Phillips Foods company, was looking for a way to add more crab to his restaurant menus. The trouble was, harvests of the beloved Maryland blue crab were in decline because of over-fishing and environmental strain. So Steve set out for Asia, seeking the Blue swimming crab, rumored to be just as tasty as the Maryland variety. What he found was more crab than he could sell. Thai fishermen were more than willing to sell off a catch they considered to be junk, so Steve launched an aggressive marketing campaign in the U.S. to create demand for his new, inexpensive “Maryland style” crabmeat.

Today the blue swimming crab, fished from the waters of Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and elsewhere outnumbers Maryland crab on U.S. dinner plates upwards of 3 to 1. It has exploded into a $300 million globalized industry that has changed the landscape, threatened the environment, and padded the fortunes of many Asian fishing villages.

Sun reporters Gady A. Epstein and Stephanie Desmon asked a local Thai seafood broker, Somsak Choeyklin, what he thinks of the blue crab now:

[He] raises up his arms – his left wrist adorned by a diamond-encrusted gold Rolex that matches his wife’s; his right wrist encircled by a solid-gold chain inscribed with a Superman-style S – and he declares triumphantly, “The [blue] crab is god!”

So if you’re hungry for the best authentic Maryland crab you can buy anywhere, here’s my vote: Cantlers Riverside Inn in Annapolis, Maryland.